


Grand-père Noël

by Akallabeth



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Canon Era, Fix-It, Found Family, Gen, actually holiday happiness fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-15
Updated: 2019-12-15
Packaged: 2021-02-10 03:40:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21461605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Akallabeth/pseuds/Akallabeth
Summary: Madame Victurnien spends 35 francs on morality, with a rather different effect than she intended.
Comments: 12
Kudos: 19
Collections: Les Mis Holiday Exchange (2019)





	Grand-père Noël

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Land_of_Domes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Land_of_Domes/gifts).

Winter 1819, M--sur--M

"I have the child."

Whatever effect Mme Victurnien intended with this pronouncement (made late one December afternoon, in the women's workshop of M. Madeleine's imitation jet factory) was probably grander than the reponse she received. A half dozen women nearest the door looked up, but turned back to their polishing and filing and fitting after a quick glance at the widow. If any noticed the weary four-year-old at her side, they made no sign of recognition.

The overseer, one Mlle Dubois, approached the new-comer, and the two made hasty conference. Those working nearby caught a few words--something about an inn, and immorality, and the reputation of the factory's owner. Nonetheless, the work continued apace, the barest sense of tension in the room channeled through downcast eyes and flitting fingers into piece after piece of shining black jewelry.

Mlle Dubois left her visitor, retrieved something from her desk in the corner, and crossed the room, stopping before a young blonde woman wearing immaculately neat peasant's dress.

"Fantine." The young woman looked up. Around her, the clacking of beads and whisper of files slowed.

"Your services are no longer needed. You will leave this establishment immediately, and you will not come back."

Fantine spoke no word. Sitting on the far side of the vast room, her back to the door, the young woman had until this point neither seen nor heard anything of the disturbance. Nor did she make any argument now, but set down her tools, and permitted Mlle Dubois to guide her towards the peg where her shawl and bonnet hung beside everyone else's. The overseer put an envelop into her hand, but Fantine still made no sign of understanding. Only when she gained the door, and came face to face with the triumphant Mme Victurnien, did Fantine seem to wake from her sleepwalking. Mme Victurnien thurst the child in front of Fantine, with a smile that spoke of causing pain rathed than easing it. 

"Cosette?" The blonde barely breathed the word at first. Repeated, the name became a cry, and through tears she embraced the small, ragged girl.

**

Later that night, in a modestly-furnished second floor room, the child slept in her mother's bed. A candle burned on the table, where the young woman conferred with her elderly neighbor.

"You will not ask the Mayor? He is a just man; surely he'll not let a child suffer."

"Monsieur the Mayor was right to turn me out, I will not contest his decision." Fantine's eyes were red with weeping, but every glance at the bed and its precious burden brought a smile to the tears.

"But what will do you?", Marguerite asked. "The child can stay with me during the day--I do my sewing in my room, there is no one to object. But she needs food, and M. Pierre will want 10 francs for the quarter's rent. However you paid before, he will not extend credit if you are not working."

"I'll find it. I sewed for a dressmaker in Paris, but I will do anything. I can scrub floors, empty slops, milk cows--"

"What of the outlying farms? You might take the child, she's near old enough to work."

Fantine's face fell again. "I owe money." She sighed. "To M. Pierre, and to the furniture dealer. I cannot leave for work."

"Do you have any money, at all?"

"Fifty-three francs, fifteen centimes. Monsieur the Mayor gave an extra fifty francs with my last three days' pay. And there the 12 francs I had put aside to send the Thénardiers."

Marguerite stared thoughtfully into the candle. "There aren't many positions that pay more than the factory. You'll have to economize."

Fantine nodded. "For Cosette's sake, I will do whatever I must."

"The garett room next to mine is open. It rents for 30 francs per year. Pay the 12 francs you have towards your debt, and move into the smaller room." She considered then the room's scant furnishings. "If you return some of the furniture--the table, one chair, and the chest of drawers--you might avoid adding to the debt. They'll want further surety, but ten or twenty francs should give you time to find work. If need be, you can return the bed frame and the washstand. A person can sleep on a mattress without a bed, if need be. Have you other clothes to pawn?"

"I have two weeks' linens, and two sets of clothes. But I should cut one for Cosette to wear--she must have outgrown the things I made for her before, but those Thénardiers sent her in such rags. And in winter!"

"Yes, she will need clothing", Marguerite agreed. "Bu do not cut yours down yet. Might you pawn the little looking glass there? And the poor bird must go, however little it eats."

Fantine looked down, then nodded in silent resolve. "There's no more to do tonight, so we ought to put out the candle. Send the child to me tomorrow, then look for work. Speak to M. Pierre when you return--perhaps you'll have work by then." 

"Goodnight, Marguerite."

"Good night, Fantine. And good luck."

**

But the next evening, as Fantine trudged up the stairs, she had no good news. Oh, M. Cheney had agreed to send his man with a cart for Fantine's furniture, but he'd also demanded 30 francs towards her debt to let her keep the bed and washstand. When she explained about needing a smaller room, M. Pierre had grumbled that he would be paid, and pretty young things could always find some money somehow.

But there was no work. Or perhaps word has spread about her being dismissed from the factory. No dressmaker or milliner in the town would take her, nor the shoemakers, nor the hosiers, nor stay-makers; none of the tailors would take her on, even for basting and sweeping up. None of these needed a servant, either. 

But, as she paused on the landing outside Marguerite's door, Fantine heard a high, childish laugh. It was the only sound which could have cut through her cloud of melancholy. For Cosette, she would find work---maybe one of the fine houses needed a servant. She'd try there tomorrow.

**

No one wanted her for a servant. The washerwomen glowered when she approached them to inquire about scrubbing clothes. The hospital had just hired a girl to clean. The shop-keepers shook their heads. The inn-keepers turned her out, the tavern-owners leered, but offered no work. Finally, one of the military contractors had need for plain sewing. Rough shirts, paid by the piece. It wasn't enough, but it was more than nothing.

As she walked back to the apartment with a bundle of cut shirt pieces, inspiration struck Fantine. The previous day, she'd returned to find Cosette laughing timidly in reponse to a silly song Marguerite remembered. The child took to the kindly old woman, and (once shown how) helped by threading needles for her. Fantine's spirits rose to see her daughter happy, even as her heart ached at the sight of the child wrapped in a coverlet for want of warm clothing.

Fantine turned down a sidestreet. An hour later, her long golden hair had become ten francs, and those ten francs had become a child's dress. It was wool, from the stall of a second-hand clothes dealer: a well-worn garment, but easily patched, and large enough to last Cosette through this winter, and possibly the next.

**

From then on, Margeurite, Fantine, and Cosette spent their days together. The women sewed by the light of a dormer window, and shared a candle when the sun failed. Cosette had recognized the knitting that Marguerite brought out late in the evening, when her elderly eyes could no longer bear to sew. More specifically, the child had picked up the needles once they were set down, and put in a dozen neat stitches before either woman realized what she'd done. The child never did seem to understand play--she'd start rocking a knotted handkerchief 'baby' at her mother's feet, but would wander off to sweep the small room, or even start to empty the chamberpot or fetch water. The next day, when Fantine went out for another bundle of shirts, she bought Cosette her own needles and wool. The child needed stockings, after all.

December was getting on. Fantine worked constantly, slept five hours a night, but smiled constantly to see her child. Cosette had new stockings and started calling Marguerite 'grand-mère'. And Marguerite considered what might be done for them. Fantine refused to see the Mayor: he was just to dismiss her, and kind to give her money towards her debts. But Marguerite wondered. The Mayor gave silver to each passing chimney-sweep lad: would he truly condemn this other child? 

The last Sunday of Advent, providence gave Marguerite her chance. She was leaving Church after low mass, when a fortuitous gust of wind snatched her shawl and tossed into the Mayor's path. He returned it with courtesy.

"Please, Monsieur Mayor, my neighbor has a child. She was dismissed from your factory for it, and no one will give her work now. She sews seventeen hours a day for twelve sous, and still owes money. Is there nothing to be done for her?" 

The man looked shocked (Marguerite hoped it was from compassion and not affront at her words), but was swept away by the crowd before he could speak.

**

Fantine took Cosette to Christmas Eve mass. Cosette was fairly entranced by the bright candlelight, and the music, but by the time they remounted the attic stairs of their home, both and daughter fairly staggered with fatigue. In dim light, Fantine's noticed nothing. Not until she was lying down, Cosette in her arms, did she notice the heavenly softness of the the bed, the unusual warmth of the blankets. Fantine has become a stranger to her own bed, but God had perhaps sent her some comfort for a Christmas present.

Fantine woke from that sweet dream, to Cosette' excited cry. She blinked the sleep from her eyes, to see Cosette holding her old wooden clog, and five franc piece inside

"Père Noël has come! He has! He never came to inn. Not for me, only for 'Ponine and 'Zelma. But he came here!"

Fantine's mind whirled. Marguerite could not afford five francs, she'd have to explain that to Cosette. No one else had access to the room, and M. Pierre certainly hadn't given her daughter most of a quarter's rent.

As she was stealing herself for that terrible moment, Fantine looked down, and noticed the warm bedrug over her worn coverlet. And the unusual softness of her mattress--or rather the featherbed layered over her thin mattress. Her eyes darted around the room. Two unfamiliar shawls hung on the pegs next her and Cosette's dresses. A fine new candle in a shiny brass holder sat next to the burned out stump on her wash stand. There was a piece of fresh white soap and a stack of new towels there, too. A picnic hamper on the floor next to it, with a white envelop.

Fantine smiled at Cosette's cheers, and murmured reassurance, while she reached for the envelop. The twenty-franc bill was self-explanatory. There were several other pieces of paper. She could not read them. Nor could she leave her room in a thread-bare nightgown.

An hour later, having washed and dressed herself and Cosette; eaten a modest breakfast from the bounty in the hamper (bread and cheese for now, though a number of dainties held out possibilities for the rest of the day); and bidden Marguerite a happy Christmas; Fantine made her way to the public letter writer. His stall was closed, but the woman at the bakery pointed out his room in a lodging house on the side-street. 

Although the scribe protested that it was Christmas, Fantine's pleas (and Cosette's excited chatter about ), he agreed to read the papers--and even waived his usual fee.

"That way it's not work," he reasoned. But Fantine recognized it for another Christmas gift.

"Mlle Fantine is invited call at No. 14 Rue T--- on the 26th of December, where employment has been found for her. She may bring her daughter The enclosed is to provide for her and her daughter's current wants", he read. "This other sheet is a full release, stating that all debts incurred by Fantine with M. Cheney, dealer in furniture, have been cleared as of December 24th, 1819. The third is the same, but for debts with a M. Pierre, landlord."

**

And so, after a jolly Christmas dinner with Marguerite and another night of heavenly sleep, Fantine and Cosette found their way to small street near the factory. No. 14 was an moderately-sized, unassuming house in a large garden. When Fantine knocked upon the door, it was opened by none other than the Mayor himself.

"Do come in, Mademoiselle. I must apologize for how you were treated when last in my employ."

Fantined nodded, too uncertain of her position to say more. She did allow herself to be led to a chair in the front room, unknowlingly imitating the day of her dismissal

"I understand you are still looking for work?"

Anither cautious nod.

"And, of course, you need to look after your daughter." Cosette, sitting on her mother's lap, hid her face in Fantine's shoulder when the Mayor smiled at her.

"Yes, sir. Though I know I cannot take her with me. My neighbor has been kind to care for her when I need to be out."

"It struck me that you may not be the only person with such a difficulty. That there is a need for someone to care for child who are too young to attend school, but whose parents need to work. Mademoiselle, would you being willing to be that person? This house is convenient to the factory, and has a spacious garden for children to play in. I shall pay for the house, and the children's suppers, and perhaps a maid as well. Would you accept a salary of forty francs per month, with accomodations in the house? There are three bedrooms beside the garret, so you could take on an assistant if needed."

"Truly?" Fantine clutched Cosette closer to her. To work by day and not through the night, to keep Cosette with her.

"I shall", Fantine agreed. "Monsieur Mayor, thank you."

The man demurred. They worked out details of when Fantine was to move in, and what accomodations should be made before the first of the year to prepare for the children.

When Fantine finally stood to take her leave, Cosette reversed her previous timidity. The child now fairly launched herself at M. Madeleine, hugging his left leg and exclaiming "Grand-père."

**Author's Note:**

> I hope this suits--I'm afraid modern AUs weren't speaking to me, though they looked very interesting.
> 
> Canonically, Fantine is fired "at the end of winter" 1819-1820; I moved that up to before Christmas 1819. Mme V forced the issue.


End file.
